Many operating systems provide a cursor that indicates a current position on a video display. The cursor is generally manipulable by an input device, such as a keyboard or a mouse. In certain operating systems, such as the Microsoft WINDOWS, version 3.1, operating system, which is sold by Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash., a window may have a status bar that displays information about the object to which the cursor is currently pointing. As the cursor is moved to point at different objects, the contents of the status bar changes accordingly. The status bar is a separate graphic entity that is not connected to the cursor and does not move with the cursor. The status bar is positioned on the video display at a fixed location within a window. As such, a user has to look at two separate portions of the screen if he wishes to view both the cursor and the status bar. This separation of the status bar from the cursor can be confusing and burdensome to the user.
Some operating systems provide static context sensitive help. Static context sensitive help provides static help information about an object. The help information is displayed at a static screen location near the object with which the static context sensitive help is associated. An example of static context sensitive help is Balloon Help described in Inside Macintosh® Volume VI pp. 11-3 to 11-10. Static context sensitive help information is limited to what the user can do. Static context sensitive help information does not give the user any information about what the user is currently doing or what the user is about to do.